The officers in command of the nent Manchu. garrison. at. Chingchou.Fu in Hupeh report a serious affray between their soldiers and the people of the country. Two stories of the affair are given by the memorialists, one coming, from their own subor., dinate officers; and the other from, the local, Chinese authorities. It seeing,. that one day in February there wasa theatrical per-, formance ina temple.at 'I'saoshih, and. a number of the. Manchus,; went to, ce, it. Karly in the afternoon a disturbance;, took \d place.on the stage, The Manchu, story gives no reason for. the trouble; but, the Chinese one says. it was. caused. by the Manchus trying to mount on to the platform against the. wish ofthe, other, spectators ie. most, serious discrepancies however occur in the account of what happened afterwards, The one side avers. that about twenty local rowdies, taking advantage of the excitement, armed: themselves, beat jongs and assembled a large crowd, with which they invaded the Manchu quarter of the town, and robbed: and assaulted: all they found, men, women and -children. Forty-seven Manchus: were afterwards officially examined and found to have received wounds on their persons. The Chinese on the other hand declare that after the disturbance on the stage, the Manchus collected an armed force and made an, onslaught: on the Chinese, The latter defended themselves. with such weapons as they.could-procure, but two-of them were so severely wounded that they died a day or'two afterwards, The Emperor's rescript regards the affair as of great gravity and desires that a thorough enquiry be eld by the Manchu authorities in, conjunction with a high officer deputed by the Hupeh Government.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.